Waxing Crescent Moon Cosmos

Photovoltaic panels passing the moon at night

The direct answer is two-fold: technically, yes, the moonlight contains photons that can activate a photovoltaic cell, but practically, no, it cannot generate any meaningful or useful electricity. [PDF Version]

Moon formation after giant impact

The hypothesis suggests that the Proto-Earth collided with a Mars -sized co-orbital protoplanet likely from the L 4 or L 5 Lagrange points of the Earth's orbit approximately 4. 5 billion years ago in the early Hadean eon (about 20 to 100 million years after the Solar System. [PDF Version]